For dividend stocks, I like to use value line statistics in the analysis to determine the relative long term safety of the dividend. Fortunately, as Intel is a Dow 30 component Value Line provides the most recent sheet free.

First the good news:
Value Line rates Intel's Financial Strength as A++ their top ranking, which comes from the decades of strong stewardship of their past earnings. And based on that their safety is a "1", which is also a top ranking. Also since 1998 Intel has raised their dividend every year showing a strong commitment to the dividend and a very good dividend policy.

The Downsides:
Since October19th 2012, Intel has been rated a "5" in timeliness meaning it is projected by Value Line to be one of the 5% worst performers in the stock market for the short to intermediate term. Indeed since then Intel has fallen a few percent why the S&P 500 is up around 10 percent from that mark. The earnings predictability score of 35 is too poor for me to make this a dependable dividend play. This score indicates that the reliability in future earnings is worse than 55% of all stocks. I need to have a stock be in the most reliable 25% if I am going to be depending on the dividend. Finally the growth persistence is only 35% which is unacceptable given the unreliable nature of Intel's earnings

Overall this stock has not enough positives for me to consider investing in despite the 4% plus dividend, if the economy were to head into another downturn this would be a stock I would be concerned would cut it's dividend, which at this point would seriously damage the stock price. The strong financials and history of this company is why this stock is listed as one of the 2013 picks in the DOGS of THE DOW, which is a proven investment strategy.

Overall though this company strikes me as a 21st century General Motors type of stock that I would avoid despite the positives.

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Well, I hedged a bit. I went and bought $5k of it Friday, and will wait until after march 1, to see if the latest budgeting arguments cause a quick downturn in market to buy the other $5k. This is just a one shot deal for me, to have a little fun, so I will let it ride as long as it looks like they will pay the dividend. Because even if I was fortunate to realize gains, I would probably lose it on buying or selling the next stock.

Since October19th 2012, Intel has been rated a "5" in timeliness meaning it is projected by Value Line to be one of the 5% worst performers in the stock market for the short to intermediate term. Indeed since then Intel has fallen a few percent why the S&P 500 is up around 10 percent from that mark.

From the Oct 19, 2012 close, the S&P 500 is up 6%, while INTC is down less than one percent.

Quote:

if the economy were to head into another downturn this would be a stock I would be concerned would cut it's dividend

INTC maintained it's dividend through 2008-2009 and began increasing it again in 2010. The S&P 500 dividend went down 20% during that time period, and only last year got back to its 2008 level.

Quote:

The strong financials and history of this company is why this stock is listed as one of the 2013 picks in the DOGS of THE DOW

Actually, the DOGS OF THE DOW are simply the 10 highest yielding stocks in the DOW without any regard to financial strength or other fundamental matters. That is why INTC is included.

In my opinion, INTC is an attractive candidate for a covered call writing strategy, and that is how I am playing it. I believe that the 4.3% dividend yield coupled with the company's financial strength will give INTC downside support should the market suffer a correction. I'm not particularly bothered by the VL timeliness rating since, if the stock is called away, it is unlikely that I will be taken out of a large move to the upside and can use the proceeds of the assignment to write cash-secured puts at roughly the same strike price. The combination of alternatively writing covered calls or cash-secured puts on a stock that trades in a relatively narrow band can significantly enhance the dividend yield in terms of income

__________________I'd rather be governed by the first one hundred names in the telephone book than the Harvard faculty - William F. Buckley

I have been enjoying my little foray into buying 10k of Intel a few months ago. The stock has jumped almost $2 in the past 2 weeks. Watching it has reaffirmed that I could never be a serious stock trader. When I think it will be going down it goes up and vice versa. Two weeks ago all the bad news about lack of PC shipments came out, and since then it has done nothing but slowly move upward.

I have been enjoying my little foray into buying 10k of Intel a few months ago. The stock has jumped almost $2 in the past 2 weeks. Watching it has reaffirmed that I could never be a serious stock trader. When I think it will be going down it goes up and vice versa. Two weeks ago all the bad news about lack of PC shipments came out, and since then it has done nothing but slowly move upward.

Actually, you are doing great. Make your own decision, ignore all the negative swirl, hold your nose and buy what you believe is a fundamentally sound equity, and hang on until the negativity dissipates and the market comes back to the name you bought. That is what you and I did with Intel. Hopefully it continues to work out.

I just bought a little ABX today mostly based on the fact that it is at multi-year lows, appears to be in one piece, and is the lowest cost producer. There is clearly downside risk, but it seems to me that people are awfully pessimistic.

__________________
"There are three kinds of men. The one that learns by reading. The few who learn by observation. The rest have to pee on the electric fence for themselves."

Actually, you are doing great. Make your own decision, ignore all the negative swirl, hold your nose and buy what you believe is a fundamentally sound equity, and hang on until the negativity dissipates and the market comes back to the name you bought. That is what you and I did with Intel. Hopefully it continues to work out.

I just bought a little ABX today mostly based on the fact that it is at multi-year lows, appears to be in one piece, and is the lowest cost producer. There is clearly downside risk, but it seems to me that people are awfully pessimistic.

I hope to watch it slowly go up, and pat myself on the back for a good call, but never sell and just keep collecting the dividends. I can stomach watching 10k drop to 6k. But I do not think I am mentally tough enough to watch 100k sink to 60k.

I bought Intel at $18 during the market crash and I saw it sank to $13. Sold it for a profit when the market recovered.

bought 1k shares at $21 for the dividend...tired of seeing .0000001% return in Money Market fund.

Can't believe this thing was at $60 back in 2000's!!!

I know exactly how I would have played it...I would have bought at 60, road it all the way down, thinking it has to come back with all the profits it is generating. Finally throwing in the towel at $15, bought it back at $30 last year thinking its on it's way up, and still be underwater a second time!

My gamble is that INTC can hold onto their market share in PCs and data center, and grow share in tablets and smartphones. I think they have a very good chance of doing so.

Intel has superior manufacturing capability and I don't see TSMC nor Global Foundries catching up. I believe this will gradually allow Intel to take market share from the ARMH zerg.

There is also always the possibility that Intel, Micron and Apple may finally team up against their nemesis, Samsung. If Intel could just get the foundry business that would be awesome. I doubt Apple will switch to x86 but who knows. They have done it before, it could happen again.

Intel has been putting a ton of money into capex. Something is up. The speculation I see a lot is a foundry deal with Apple.

Intel has done nothing but go downhill since CFB and clifp retired and left there.....

__________________
Consult with your own advisor or representative. My thoughts should not be construed as investment advice. Past performance is no guarantee of future results (love that one).......:)

I am long INTC as well, although I don't expect huge capital gains from this stock (I set up an alert in 2001 for when INTC dips below $21 and 12 years later I still get those emails fairly regularly!). It's a very cyclical stock. The key I think is to buy it on the dips.

Actually, the DOGS OF THE DOW are simply the 10 highest yielding stocks in the DOW without any regard to financial strength or other fundamental matters. That is why INTC is included.

A stock to be included in the Dow Jones Industrial Average needs to be displaying financial strength and a leader in the industry, otherwise you are dropped from the index. By the nature of the index and the types of stocks to choose from in the Dogs of the Dow strategy you are placed in that group of stocks which has historically done very well because I believe of those characteristics. That is all I was poorly trying to say in regards to that.

As to the safety of the dividend this stock is just above the dividend safety of bank stocks in 2007 in my mind. I do not think it is a good sign when there have been 18 instances of insider selling in the last year for Intel with no insider buying when the stock is so apparently cheap. The increase in long term debt which was stable at around 2 billion from 2002-2010 to 13 billion dollars today also exposes this company to increases in interest rates. Easy to add debt when rates are low, hard to adjust if times get tough. Most of this money was used to buy shares back, in capital intensive industries I do not at all understand that coporate strategy. Additionally while income tax rates have declined from 31% of net to 25% the net after tax margins have dropped from 27 percent to 18 percent in the last 4 years. Sales for the last 3 years are flat at 53 billion. Most likely these along with lower than expected earnings reports have led to a Value Line rating of "5".

I would never own a stock with a "5" rating from Value Line, this is where most of the bank stocks were in 2007 before their massive fall. This for me is the one blinking light I always pay attention when it is flashing. But I do understand and respect the bull case for this stock as well. But an economic downturn and a dividend cut and this is a $10 stock, again just from my point of view.

A stock to be included in the Dow Jones Industrial Average needs to be displaying financial strength and a leader in the industry, otherwise you are dropped from the index. By the nature of the index and the types of stocks to choose from in the Dogs of the Dow strategy you are placed in that group of stocks which has historically done very well because I believe of those characteristics. That is all I was poorly trying to say in regards to that.

As to the safety of the dividend this stock is just above the dividend safety of bank stocks in 2007 in my mind. I do not think it is a good sign when there have been 18 instances of insider selling in the last year for Intel with no insider buying when the stock is so apparently cheap. The increase in long term debt which was stable at around 2 billion from 2002-2010 to 13 billion dollars today also exposes this company to increases in interest rates. Easy to add debt when rates are low, hard to adjust if times get tough. Most of this money was used to buy shares back, in capital intensive industries I do not at all understand that coporate strategy. Additionally while income tax rates have declined from 31% of net to 25% the net after tax margins have dropped from 27 percent to 18 percent in the last 4 years. Sales for the last 3 years are flat at 53 billion. Most likely these along with lower than expected earnings reports have led to a Value Line rating of "5".

I would never own a stock with a "5" rating from Value Line, this is where most of the bank stocks were in 2007 before their massive fall. This for me is the one blinking light I always pay attention when it is flashing. But I do understand and respect the bull case for this stock as well. But an economic downturn and a dividend cut and this is a $10 stock, again just from my point of view.

I am not a financial expert, and although I bought about 500 shares of it, I would never buy enough of this or any stock to cause me major financial pain. Your concerns were the negatives I worried about, plus declining PC sales. The positives as mentioned by others are anticipating them muscling their way into the tablet and phone markets, contract chip work, Internet security, amongst other businesses they are trying to grow.

Is the reason they borrow to buy shares back partially because the interest rate from borrowing is cheaper interest than the dividend payout "interest rate"? If I understand correctly, borrowing also helps lower the corporate tax rate. I have read that many people claim to buy the stock in the lower 20's and sell when it is in the upper 20's and repeat the process.

Is the reason they borrow to buy shares back partially because the interest rate from borrowing is cheaper interest than the dividend payout "interest rate"? If I understand correctly, borrowing also helps lower the corporate tax rate. I have read that many people claim to buy the stock in the lower 20's and sell when it is in the upper 20's and repeat the process.

There are a lot of considerations that go into leveraging a corporate balance sheet to buy back shares. Cost of funds is definitely a consideration. I think the INTC buyback activity looks a lot like LOW 2 or 3 years ago. They were extremely out of favor, housing was never going to recover, etc. But LOW had a solid balance sheet and they issued debt and bought back a truckload of stock. Between that and housing coming back, the stock went from about 20 to the high 30s pretty quickly.

__________________
"There are three kinds of men. The one that learns by reading. The few who learn by observation. The rest have to pee on the electric fence for themselves."

Personally I am bit skeptical of all of these rating services. Schwab has Intel at C, Morningstar says 4 stars, and Value Line has it a 5 timeliness the worse. All claim that following there guidelines produce superior results, yet mutual funds that I have tried this somehow don't seem to do so well.

I do agree there is more risk to the dividend than meets the eye. Listening to the conference call, it sounds like management is more concerned about not having sufficient capacity than too much. If the PC business continue to deteriorate, profits will decline dramatically and the dividend could be in danger. Never the less, if the semiconductor computer business is like the banking business in 2007, than Intel is much more like Wells Fargo or JP Morgan than BofA or Citigroup.

I completely disagree with you about the wisdom of taking on more debt to buy back stock. I think is very smart financial engineering. Look at the debt they issued back in Dec, 5 year bonds @1.35% and 10 year with a 2,7% coupon 20 year @4% coupon and 30 year debt @4.25%. All this used to buy back stock at < $21 with a dividend yield over for 4.25%. The interest on the debt is tax deductible where dividends are paid after tax. The bonds are callable if interest rate continue to stay low or decline. If dividends increase then this is move is an even a wiser course. The financial leverage of 1.65 is hardly enough to be troubling. Since INTC current assets easily cover the total debt and are also equal to 4 years of dividend payments.

IMO there is no point in have AA credit rating at time of historically low interest rates if you don't take advantage of it.

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